Friday, October 29, 2004

Suicide Club

I should have known. But sometimes, you know, you just never know. As was the case with “Suicide Club.” This movie is available now at your local Hell Pit or Netflix (where we got ours) and, well…it sucks.

First off, this is a Japanese flick, which isn’t an inherently bad thing. I’m sure there are plenty of good Japanese flicks out there – I just haven’t seen any. I liked Crouching Tiger and Hero, but they don’t count because they are both Chinese films and, well, as much as the patrons at the local Wal-Mart would like to believe, they just aren’t the same.

I have seen one other Japanese film: Samurai Fiction. I have to admit, I was hypnotized by the spiffy box cover on this one: silhouettes with swords against red backgrounds just kick ass.

Unfortunately, the movie did not. Let’s just say that contemporary martial arts, combined with urban scores, and really, really insipid dialogue does not make for a good movie. I turned it off before it made it to the forty-five minute mark – this movie was bad. Worse than Suicide Club by far.

By the way, I can’t remember for sure, but I think that’s where I first heard of Suicide Club – during the previews on Samurai Fiction.

Anyhow, Suicide Club is about (brace yourself) a suicide club. Well, more specifically, it’s about a bunch of Suicide Clubs, but for simplicity, they’ve consolidated them into an easier to handle singular form. Apparently, these clubs are proliferating on the Internet, and whether or not they are tied together (forming one singular club as the title infers), or if they’re all just copycats of one another seems to be the police’s biggest concern. (The fact that there are hundreds of deaths in a two-day period, not so much. But whether or not they’re related, well, THAT needs to be answered.)

So, I think that’s a pretty cool idea in itself – strange enough to keep me interested, and not hokey enough to turn me off. But then the movie never actually connected anything. It was like watching me try to make a decision on where to go out to eat:

Me: How bout Chinese?

SockHobbit: Sure

Me: Okay…

SockHobbit: …

Me: Do you not want Chinese? Cause if you don’t, we don’t have to go…

SockHobbit: Whatever you want; I’m fine with anything.

Me: Well…is there anything you’re not in the mood for?

SockHobbit: No Mexican, no Italian.

Me: Okay, so…Chinese then?

SockHobbit Sure

Me: What about pizza?

SockHobbit Isn’t that Italian?

Me: Not if it’s from Round Table – they don’t count.

See, my thing is that I feel like no matter what I pick, it is the wrong choice; I am missing out on the other options. I think that’s precisely what was wrong with Suicide Club. Only their conversation went (more or less):

Writer: So, there’s these kids, right? And they all jump in front of a subway train, okay?

Director: Hmm…are they girls?

Writer Sure. Whatever. But see, they all jump, right? And then you cut to this strange white hand bag, right?

Director: Are they in the schoolgirl outfits? I like those.

Writer: Umm…yeah, that’s fine. But see, then you get the police involved –

Director: How about pop music? I like that teen pop thing going on right now…you know?

Writer: I don’t really see how it fits…this is kind of a mystery…

Director No, I know. See, the teen pop kids are involved, see?

Writer: But…the script…it doesn’t really have teen –

Director They’ll be five of them! And they’ll be girls! Five of them! And they’ll sing and dance like…who’s that? The pop band?

Writer Umm…The Backstreet Boys?

Director Yeah. Only girls. Not guys, okay? Girls.

Writer I guess…I mean…it doesn’t really fit the current script; I’ll have to –

Director And we’ll have a weird psycho guy, right? Like Hanibal Lector mixed with Sid Viscious! And they’ll have a….a…uh…a BOWLING ALLEY for a lair!

Writer: Bowling alley? Why are they in a bowling alley?

Director You don’t like to bowl?

Writer It’s okay, I guess –

Director Well, there you go.

Writer But…why?

Director Who cares? When do we start shooting?

I could go on and on. Basically, this movie tried to be a blend of The Sixth Sense, Seven, and Evil Dead…it just didn’t know if it wanted to go with the suspense thing, mystery thing, horror thing, or drama thing.